Saturday, April 26, 2014

While I'm Creating

I've been bitten by a creative bug lately - all of the craft sites and Pinterest are bombarding me with inspiration. Unfortunately, I have the attention span of a toddler right now so my house is covered with half-done projects. So while I'm finishing I'll share a picture of some sweet sleeping babies:

Tuesday, April 15, 2014

Weekend of Shows

I usually don't get out much beyond the grocery store (starving teens eat so darn much), but this past weekend was a whirlwind of activity. On Saturday, the Prairie fiber Arts Guild held a yarn and fiber show in Chillicothe, the town where my parents live. Eric made sure I had enough gas in my car for the hour drive, and Kerry and I hit the highway. I dropped him off with Grandpa and Mom and I checked out the show. It was small but really nice. I forgot to take pictures, darn it, but we met loads of vendors (one who made amazing Fimo buttons and I didn't get a card darn it) and met a baby ram. I picked up a few things:

some lovely silky merino from Spry Whimsy Fiber Arts

a gorgeous purply BFL braid from Leading Men Fiber Arts

and a super cool fossil pendant from a man named Phil Krumholz - his card says Art to Wear but he doesn't have a website sadly, his jewelry was gorgeous.
Sunday brought the rock and mineral show here in my town. It's held every year but this was our first time going. I took Khloe and one of her friends and we had a ball looking at all of the pretties. We picked up a few treasures:

Khloe got a geode, a slice of stained glass-like stone, and a piece of chalcopyrite from Mexico.

I got a little stone egg for my collection

and some little purple polished stones that may become pendants with some knotting or wire wrapping. There was a "fossil dig" for kids that was boxes of pebbles full of polished stones and shark teeth. Each of the girls picked out something. I would have chosen one of the very large teeth if I could have - they were neat.
I was pretty worn out from all of that socializing but it was great. I also learned something, especially at the fiber show. One of the vendors was selling handmade jewelry - pretty stuff. It was all the kinds of things I've made over the years. I looked at her prices and it hit me - not everyone can make things. I have a rather easy time figuring things out and tend to undervalue it as a skill. I need to appreciate my talents more and not consider myself "less than" someone who can sing or who has amazing people skills. I tell my kids that everyone is special and has their own special skills. It's time to listen to myself.

Tuesday, April 1, 2014

Dolly Clackett Dress

I have another new dress to share! It's for the Dolly Clackett sewalong Roisin makes beautiful dresses and the sewalong is to celebrate her upcoming wedding by making dresses in her style. This is from Mc'Call's 6859, a vintage pattern from 1963. I really like how it turned out. It looks a little wrinkly in the picture because Khloe was in a hurry to get done - it got rather chilly while we were out. It fits great and I got several compliments while we were out.

The fabric is from Wal-Mart. It's a light weight cotton. I lined the top with fabric that I cut off of a too-long slip. It was the first time I lined something that didn't call for it and I did pretty good. It has a zipper up the back and I used the instructions on the zipper package to sew a lapped zip instead of my usual visible style. That's all for today. I have another dress about half done and will be sharing it soon.